ABC has picked up the Latino drama project “Promised Land” to series. The show is described as an epic, generation-spanning drama about two Latinx families vying for wealth and power in California’s Sonoma Valley.
The cast includes John Ortiz as Joe Sandoval, Cecilia Suárez as Lettie Sandoval, Augusto Aguilera as Mateo, Christina Ochoa as Veronica Sandoval, Mariel Molino as Camila Sandoval, Tonatiuh as Antonio Sandoval, Andres Velez as Carlos, Katya Martín as Juana and Rolando Chusan as Billy.
Matt Lopez is set to write and executive produce the pilot. Lopez has developed a number of projects with ABC and other broadcasters in the past. He most recently created and executive produced the CTV drama “Gone,” starring Chris Noth, Leven Rambin and Danny Pino. As a feature writer, his credits include “The Sorcerer’s Apprentice,” “Race to Witch Mountain,” “Bedtime Stories” and “The Wild.” He is currently also a writer on the new “Father of the Bride” Cuban-American-centered remake starring Andy García, Gloria Estefan, Diego Boneta, Adria Arjona and Isabel Merced.
Adam Kolbrenner and Maggie Malina executive produce alongside Lopez, and Michael Cuesta executive produces and directs. ABC Signature will serve as the studio.
The network also announced today that romantic anthology series pilot “Epic” from “Once Upon a Time” creators Adam Horowitz and Edward Kitsis is no longer moving forward.
The show promised to “reinvent fairytale for a new audience.” “Epic” was written and executive produced by Brigitte Hales with Horowitz and Kitsis. Hales had worked with the duo prior to the pilot, having written eight episodes of “Once Upon a Time” and served as a story editor for over 50 episodes. The Alphabet Network gave out a pilot order to the one-hour drama in January and James Griffiths (“Stumptown,” “Black-ish”) had been tapped to direct and executive produce the pilot. Eleanor Fanyinka, Brittany O’Grady and Alexander Hodge were slated to star.
ABC had picked up the most new pilots of any of its broadcast competitors earlier this year and ordered several new projects for the 2021-2022 television season. However, many of these— including “Acts of Crime,” “Dark Horse,” “National Parks,” “Triage,” “Adopted,” “Black Don’t Crack,” “Bucktown,” “Bossy,” “Work Wife” and the untitled Alec Baldwin and Kelsey Grammer project —were terminated and are no longer going forward.